More Information on Elder Homelessness

There is an increasing amount of information about homelessness among the elderly available online. Below are some resources where you can find information about homelessness among the elderly/older adults and related issues.

2013 Annual Homeless Assessment Report to Congress

This report, published annual by HUD, provides the results of local counts of people experiencing homeless on a single night in January.

Boston College Center for Retirement Research

The Center has a wealth of information about older adults and economic security.

The Corporation for Supportive Housing: Serving Vulnerable Populations: Older Adults & The Elderly

CSH, our partner in the National Leadership Initiative to End Elder Homelessness (NLI), has compiled a list of articles and papers with a focus on supportive housing as a solution.

The Elder Economic Security Index

The Index is a measure of economic security for older adults which benchmarks basic costs of living for elder households.

• The Index was developed by Wider Opportunities for Women in collaboration with the Gerontology Institute at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

Ending Elder Homelessness: the effectiveness of service-enriched housing

Hearth released this report, which focuses on both the problem and solution of elder homelessness, in late 2009.

Ending Homelessness Among Older Adults and Seniors Through Supportive Housing

In 2011, The NLI released this policy paper which focuses on supportive housing as the key to ending elder homelessness.

• Leading Age summarized the paper on their web site.

Geriatric Syndromes in Older Homeless Adults

One of the co-authors of this research paper is Dr. Rebecca Brown, a Hearth Board Member. The study illustrates that older homeless adults are frailer than their housed counterparts. (2011)

• Hebrew Senior Life’s Institute for Aging Research has a good summary of the findings.

Helping Chronically Homeless People Avoid High-Cost Health Care

The National Alliance to End Homelessness (NAEH) issued this brief in 2011. Issues related to chronically homeless individuals often overlap with those of the elderly homelessness, especially in regards to their health.
 

Homelessness Resource Center: Populations: Elderly

The Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration‘s Homelessness Resource Center has links to various articles and papers about the elderly homeless.

• Hearth Program Social Worker Kathy MacDonald was featured on their Voices from the Field blog

LeadingAge: Center for Housing Plus Services

LeadingAge, one our partners in the National Leadership Initiative, launched the Center for Housing Plus Services in 2012 to serve as a national catalyst for the development, adoption and support of innovative housing solutions that enable low- and modest-income seniors to age safely and successfully in their homes and communities.

The Rising Elderly Population

In 2010 NAEH published this report about the elderly homeless as part of their Demographics of Homelessness Series.

Shelter Partnership, Inc: Homeless Older Adults Strategic Plan

Shelter Partnership, another partner in the National Leadership Initiative to End Elder Homelessness, published this in depth study of homelessness among older adults and its related issues in 2008.

• An executive summary of the study is also available.